Reparations—a dividing line for white people! Which Side Are You On?

Reparations is the burning question of our time.

On April 16-17, 2016, the African People’s Socialist Party broke new ground in the struggle for reparations. The Uhuru Solidarity Movement, the organization of white people working under the leadership of the Party, held a national conference in Florida to recruit whites from throughout the U.S. to join the mass movement for “White Reparations to African People.”

The Party created the white solidarity movement under its leadership based on the understandings of African Internationalism, developed by Party Chairman Omali Yeshitela, proving that the system of capitalism was born from the parasitic assault on Africa, the enslavement of African people and colonialism around the world.

African Internationalism explains that white people sit on the pedestal of slavery and genocide in a society built on stolen African labor and the stolen land of the indigenous people.

It is based on this understanding that the Party built the African People’s Solidarity Committee in 1976 and its mass organization, the Uhuru Solidarity Movement (USM) to win white people to jump off the pedestal of oppression and turn our backs on the legacy of slavery and colonialism that we inherit and benefit from.

In this period when the Party is growing around the world, USM’s conference was a major success, raising over $10,000 for the Uhuru Movement’s economic programs called Black Star Industries, and recruiting white people from over 20 cities to get involved in the reparations movement. It was an historic event!

For white people, the reparations demand brings to the surface the bloody history of our centuries-old parasitic relationship to African people.

It exposes our complicity in the oppression, slavery, torture, genocide, and lynchings of African people. It reveals the origins of our prosperity and white power in the assault on Africa and enslavement of African people that birthed the wealth of capitalism, Wall St, the American government, and white society at large.

It requires that we take responsibility for this legacy and take action to rectify our relationship to the African community.

Gazi Kodzo video exposes divisions in the white community

Gazi Kodzo, a leading member of the African People’s Socialist Party, is well-known for his popular online video commentaries on colonialism and Black power.

During the USM conference, Gazi Kodzo recorded his latest video, entitled “White People Are Paying Reparations.”

Kodzo’s video resulted in a fresh wave of recruits into the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, white people who pay reparations to Black Star Industries.

However, as part of the polarization of the white world in this era of imperialist crisis, the USM convention and Gazi’s video also saw an outpouring of reactionary venom from white people who went out of their way to let us know how much they oppose the reparations demand.

Many of the profanity-laden messages received by USM included death threats against the African community, such as a promise to “pay reparations in the form of a bullet to your skull when the great cleansing comes,” as “Light Spire” at lightseek@gmail.com wrote to us.

While a couple of these attackers proclaimed their support of billionaire presidential candidate Donald Trump, the reality is that their stance on reparations more explicitly recalls the position of the “leftist” U.S. presidential candidate Bernie Sanders who famously vocalized his opposition to reparations because, he said, the issue is “too divisive.”

In a society built on slavery, nothing draws the line more sharply than the demand for reparations!

When you draw the reparations line, everything comes into focus—and it becomes impossible to see any distinction between a “liberal” fox and a “conservative” wolf.

For example, we can see no difference between a Trump supporter and a Bernie supporter when it comes to the issue of reparations—which is the defining question that determines whether you unite with imperialist white power or unite with the African liberation movement.

Reparations exposes that America’s “left vs right” is a false dichotomy, with both left and right flanks of imperialism hand-in-hand in their conviction that African people should never reclaim the resources and self-determination denied to them by a bloodsucking capitalist system.

Former solidarity members join the lynch mob attacks

Joining the onslaught of white reactionary attacks on the Party were perennial anti-Party white nationalists Matthew Willis and Avi Satlow, two former Uhuru Solidarity Movement members who have devoted their lives to stalking Uhuru activists, publishing slander on the internet about the Party, and attempting to counter-organize USM members (without any success.) Willis in particular has a long and sordid history of opportunism and white nationalist attacks on the Party.

Reparations IS divisive—and it must be!

Sanders is right about one thing: Reparations is the most divisive issue, because it is the only one that strikes directly to the rotten core of this oppressive social system and forces white people to confront what must be done to overturn the legacy of slavery and genocide.

Reparations is the repossession of the stolen value of the wealth, labor and resources of African people. It breaks up a social system in which white people sit on the pedestal of the oppression and exploitation of African people and the theft of land from the Indigenous people of the “Americas.”

Reparations means repairing the damage and paying back what was stolen. It means taking responsibility for the legacy of white terrorism against African people in which white people hanged tens of thousands of African men, women and children from trees in the United States for over a hundred years at the turn of the century.

Reparations is a response to the daily police murders of African people, including African children such as Tamir Rice, that serve as modern-day state-sanctioned lynchings. Reparations is the truly progressive political agenda of any white person who wants to rectify our oppressive relationship to African people through material solidarity with the struggle for African self-determination.

It is easy for us white people to claim that we are anti-racist, to carry a “black lives matter” sign, to date an African person, or to grow dreadlocks. None of these things will change the material conditions faced by African people in this country. “Showing up” against racism will not break down the prison bars that cage over 1.5 million Africans. It will not change the fact that white families possess 22 times the wealth of the average African family.

Only reparations will change this reality.

To oppose reparations is to express allegiance to the status quo of a system born from and sustained by oppression.

Defend the Party! Fight for Reparations!

The explosive growth of the African People’s Socialist Party – and the Uhuru Solidarity Movement – is evidence that the world is changing, and reparations is becoming a reality—not a slogan. USM’s victorious 2016 conference shows that thousands of white people are hearing the call for reparations and uniting with our role and responsibility to unleash the stolen resources hoarded in the white world as a consequence of six centuries of colonialism.

We call on all members and supporters of the Uhuru Solidarity Movement to strengthen your resolve and unity with the African Liberation Movement. In this time of growth, the state and white nationalists of all stripes will escalate their attacks on the African revolution. As Mao Tse Tung once said, when the revolution is being attacked by its enemies, it means the revolution is winning. It also means that we must defend the revolution at all costs and without hesitation.

We must defend the African People’s Socialist Party!We must defend our Chairman Omali Yeshitela. We must defend the African People’s Solidarity Committee and the Uhuru Solidarity Movement.

As white people, we have the right to turn our backs on white power and to fight for reparations to African people every day until victory is won and independence for African people in our lifetime is achieved!

The lines are being drawn! That’s a good thing.

Are you in the anti-reparations camp with these white people announcing their desire to kill African people, slanderous ex-solidarity members, and Bernie the Zionist? Or are you in the camp of white solidarity with African liberation—the Uhuru Solidarity Movement, “black power in white face.”

Which side are you on?

Hundreds of white people are joining the Uhuru Solidarity Movement. They are joining because they see that reparations and solidarity with African liberation is a positive vision that enables sectors of the white oppressor nation population to break ranks from our white ruling class and join the rest of humanity.

How about you? If you’re on the fence, THIS IS THE TIME TO MAKE YOUR DECISION and be clear about where you stand.

If you’re already a member, redouble your efforts. Upgrade your sustainership. Become active in your community! If you see a slanderous or reactionary comment on one of our USM pages, please report to us by messaging our main USM facebook page. We will take care of it. Comment on our links. Show your support. Be loud and proud that you unite with Black Power and reparations now!

About The Author

UHURU! Wow; very meaningful article, so glad the attacks are being addressed! Nothing frightens white nationalists more than seeing other white persons join the colonized against the oppressor! #ReparationsNow!

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